I gave three presentations this week at the Futurebuild and Footprint+ conferences in London.
The feedback I have been getting is striking: the idea that resonated most strongly across all three talks was the importance of reconnecting with hope.
Whether through a short visualisation exercise as part of a ten-minute talk, or a longer discussion about our shared visions for the built environment, the conversation seemed to change the atmosphere in the room.
It felt strangely radical.
A wave is not water.
It is an emergent phenomenon created when wind moves across the surface of water. The more aligned and sustained the movement of air, the larger the wave becomes.
Perhaps hope works in a similar way.
Most of us probably carry quiet desires for safety, for belonging, for beauty, for healing, for thriving.
But individually those desires can remain diffuse and disconnected.
When we share those desires, and discover our shared alignment, a wind of change begins to move through the group, and hope rises like a wave.
A sense of possibility emerges.
Something that we can build with others.
But it only happens when we keep the shared conversations going about what we collectively aspire towards.